I am just pleased I held off from pre ordering a device from a company that is truly open (TM). Even Android devices seem better than the myriad of nonsense one has to put up with Jolla and their dodging of important questions.

Not to mention the fanboys Jolla seems to have lingering around who defend the most indefensible things. At present, from rainisto's post, 2014 may see the release of flasher for developers (warranty void?) so another month(s) of waiting

I don't think Jolla folks are thrilled about using Qualcomm. But they chose it for some reason.

Originally Posted by MartinK

On the other hand, their latest mobile systems fortunately seem to be using their own GPUs & open drivers. But I'm still not sure even the latest Intel mobile systems do the same things in the same power envelope as ARM based SOCs.

Well, Intel is playing the catch up game for a long time already. At some point they need to really catch up. Would be interesting to see if some handsets with Merrifield are coming out next year. I suspect Intel is the only chance to get Sailfish in the future running on native drivers without libhybris hacks. Can't say about flashing aspects and so on though. Some more info about Merrifield is supposed to be published in February.

We are working on solution where end user can reset their devices back to factory state, even if they have managed to get their devices filesystem in non bootable state (as long as btrfs works). That will most likely happen with custom recovery mode which will be installed at some coming update. More info will be available next year.

We are also investigating if we can offer real flashing solution without breaking device security, but for now the approach will most likely be to update recovery image which will allow resetting back to factory state (after querying devicelock code if that has been set).

We are working on solution where end user can reset their devices back to factory state, even if they have managed to get their devices filesystem in non bootable state (as long as btrfs works). That will most likely happen with custom recovery mode which will be installed at some coming update. More info will be available next year.

We are also investigating if we can offer real flashing solution without breaking device security, but for now the approach will most likely be to update recovery image which will allow resetting back to factory state (after querying devicelock code if that has been set).

Thanks for the 'update' on this.
But, quite frankly, this is dissapointing news.
Initially this was expected to be a open device, based on the experience from Nokia and limitations.
Perhaps my Jolla will end up in my local museum for useless stuff.
Unless, of course, either Jolla comes up with a flashing solution and tools, factory images, including sources etc.
Or, I can use some less available Qualcomm tools to break this thing apart.

So for the time being we are driving through the desert without a spare tire?

Yes currently the spare tire is the care centers flashing stations. But update is coming soon, which gives you factory spare tire.

Originally Posted by ste-phan

"real flashing solution without breaking device security"
-> Just curious would be the disadvantage of broken security on

The thing which we protect is that if you have set devicelock code and someone steals your device, then he/she is not able to wipe it clean for selling it off by reflashing without knowning your lockcode.

One vision would be to offer imei based certificate which would allow flashing your own devices that have been registered to your Jolla account. And that would most certainly be behind some warranty void submit button. But lets see what spring will bring us, upcoming rescue image should offer solution to recover from most of the basic booting problems.

The thing which we protect is that if you have set devicelock code and someone steals your device, then he/she is not able to wipe it clean for selling it off by reflashing without knowning your lockcode.

The thing which we protect is that if you have set devicelock code and someone steals your device, then he/she is not able to wipe it clean for selling it off by reflashing without knowning your lockcode.

Honestly, if someone steals my phone I do not care much if that person is able to wipe and sell it, it's gone for me anyhow, it would not return just because the bootloader is locked, but would end up in a trashcan or sold in parts. Until thieves start to watch out specially for jollas there's still a long way to go...

The IMEI solution sounds nice, but a but complicated... is it possible that the user just sets a flag "allow free flashing y/n" and that it is disabled by default? I guess for many people here the risk of bricking is higher than the risk of theft.